The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1887-03-15

accommodation are we gong TO oHer!
We pointed out last week that our
citizens used too little their right Of
public meeting and free discussion.
What we require is public discussion
of public affairs. In free countries
like the United States, Great Britain
and the British Colonies, the right of
discussion is freely used. Indeed
both Crown Ministers and opposition
members are only too eager to have an
opportunity of meeting their friends
and opponents face to face, of ex-
planning their views and policy in
such way that all can understand.
In the discussions that arise, every
man, whether he has vote or not can
exercise his right to speak if he can
get his audience to hear him. In the
free governments we cite it is the de-
sire of the rulers to have such free dis
cussion, good comes of it. Men I'M
derstand their responsibilities. They
learn that government is not for a
class but for the whole; that measures,
which may weigh harshly upon some
members of the State, have to be
borne, because they are for the gen
eral good.
Now this very question of govern
ment for class is one which needs
thorough ventilation here. Article Is
of the Constitution says:
ARTICLE 10. The King conducts His Gov
for he for
the profit, honor, or private interest of any
one man, family, or class of men among His
subjects.
It is very plain that the Govern
ment which has taken for its watch
word Hawaii for the Hawaiian" is
ruling for the benefit of a "class of
men," As things are managed now,
for a man to be of American or Eu-
ropean parentage, though he be sub
iect of the realm, though he may have
been born here, though his life is to
be spent here, is to have bar set
against him for any employment un-
der the executive. Those white men
who still hold Office under the present
Government know that they hold it
merely as stop gaps, till the Govern
ment gets brazen enough to turn them
out and put incompetents in their
place.
Look at such men as Mr.. Kapena,
placed at the head of the Custom
House, or Mr.. Junius Kaae, holding
the position of Registrar of Public
Accounts, or Mr.. Alapai, the Road
Supervisor of the district of Kona,
Oahu, and we might cite dozens more.
These men are incompetent. It is
farce that is being played. They hold
sinecures, and some hard working
clerk has to do the duty which they
neglect.
This question, discussed at half
dozen meetings would soon be settled.
No government on earth could in the
face of sturdily and constantly
expressed public opinion dare to defy
it, and these incompetents would dis
appear into the oblivion that they de-
serve.
Questions of roads, of mismanage-
ment of public funds, and the count
less corrruptions of the Hawaiian Au-
tocratic Government would fall under
the lash of the tongue and wither and
wilt far more readily than under the
lash of the pen. Moreover men would
learn to speak out, We are all ready
enough to speak out in America OF
England and we ought to be fearless
in speaking out here. We brought
that inheritance with rs from the New
England States and from Europe,
when we came to make this country
our home. We did not come here to
play at free institutions, we came here
to thoroughly enjoy them. The Eu-
ropean and American on these Islands
is not here on sufferance, he is here
of right, and he is here to exercise his
right, to build up a powerful and
prosperous State, not on effete and
feudal ideas, but on broad modern
principles of popular freedom
1t is the people that make the State.
they who supply the money for car
rying on the government for paying
the salaries Of office-holders. The
money which comes from their energy
and their enterprise must be spent as
those who contribute it desire. II the
machinery by which they are ruled is
bad, so much the worse for the ma
chinery, it must be so amended that
it will work tremendously for the good
of those who keep it going.
Such questions are open for discus
sion and should be discussed with the
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